Jamesie O'Connor: Davy Fitzgerald must address Clare’s discipline issues
Last Updated: 01/06/15 10:56am
Jamesie O'Connor reflects on Clare's Munster Championship defeat by Limerick and looks ahead to Galway's big Leinster Championship clash with Dublin.
O’Connor: Ill-discipline costing Clare
The hurling championship kicked off in earnest last Sunday as Limerick defeated Clare and Sky sports pundit Jamesie O’Connor has picked out the biggest talking points from that action-packed game while also looked ahead to this weekend’s game between Dublin and Galway.
Do Clare have a discipline problem?
Back in our time with Ger Loughnane we played training matches that were very physical and he effectively swallowed the whistle. That is no different to what Kilkenny do now but, while it builds toughness, it can be counterproductive.
With Clare, it may be the case that bad habits have been formed because stuff has been let go in training when in reality it is going to be whistled in the matches. Certainly some of Clare’s tackling left a lot to be desired and Colm Lyons did pull them for it last weekend. That is something the Clare management need to take stock of and address for the rest of the summer going forward.
Another point worth making is that it is hard enough to win these matches with 15 men on the field. Trying to win them with 14 can be close to impossible. Looking at Clare, Podge Collins was sent off last year against Wexford, Brendan Bugler was sent off against Wexford, Jack Browne got two yellow cards against Wexford, Bugler was sent off in the league against Dublin this year and obviously Pat Donnellan walked on Sunday.
This is not a dirty team by any stretch of the imagination but acts of indiscipline have really hurt them and it is an area the Clare management and players are going to have to reflect on.
Were both red cards in Limerick’s win over Clare justified?
In relation to the first red card, I don’t think Donnellan left him with any choice. Looking at it on television afterwards – I was at the game but didn’t have a good view – it was reckless by Donnellan. He is by no means a dirty player but when the linesman saw it, and it happened right in front of him, Colm Lyons had no choice and he had to go.
The second sending off relates to an issue I have in general with the game. I have a lot of sympathy for the forward that is coming on and the back comes over and ‘welcomes’ him to the game with a shoulder or whatever. What does he do? He has a split second to react and he responds. He doesn’t want to be seen to be backing down and you often get this kind of rutting match going on.
It is something I would like to see stamped out. To me, it is pointless. What are they trying to prove? In one sense I have sympathy for Seanie Tobin but he did lead with the hurley into Pat ‘Connor’s ribs and he gave the referee a reason to send him off when O’Connor hit the ground.
There was an element of levelling it up with Clare already down to 14 men. With human nature being what it is, Colm Lyons was always going to be more prone to take action after sending Donnellan off.
Where does last weekend’s result leave Limerick and Clare?
It was a local derby and there is no doubt both sides desperately wanted to win it but in a way it is a dubious enough prize. Limerick will now play Tipperary, and even though they will have them in the Gaelic Grounds, it is a Tipp team that Limerick have caused a lot of pain in the last few years. Particularly last year, Tipp looked to have the game won and Limerick snatched victory from the jaws of defeat and you could see how devastated the Tipp players were after that defeat.
So you will have a very motivated Tipp team and they will be desperate not to lose to Limerick three years in a row. If Limerick lose that game, they might find it hard to pick themselves up in a short timeframe for what could potentially be a tricky tie in the qualifier.
Clare now have five or six weeks to take stock. If the draw pans out, they can get a couple of wins under their belt and find a bit of form and confidence. They need to find out what their best 15 is and that was something the qualifiers allowed them to do in 2013. By the time they got to the business end of things that year they looked a lot better than they did earlier in the championship.
Is Cian Lynch the type of potent forward Limerick have been missing in recent years?
Cian Lynch was excellent. I knew about his underage pedigree. I had seen him with the Limerick minors and obviously his bloodlines – being a cousin of Ciaran Carey – are pretty good as well.
What you don’t know is whether a guy that has the tools physically and the skill can cope and survive in the heat on the Munster Championship.
It doesn’t often come as easily as it appeared to come to Lynch at the weekend. He fought for the 50/50 balls, he got three points from play and he was a handful for the Clare defence all afternoon.
For a Limerick team that was maybe one scoring forward short of beating Kilkenny last year, they may very well have got their man. He will take a huge amount of confidence out of the way he met the Clare challenge at the weekend.
It is a huge boost for TJ Ryan and credit has to go to the Limerick management as well. Sometimes managers are reluctant to start younger players but they obviously saw in training that this guy had all the tools required and he was putting the work in as well.
Gavin O’Mahony was quoted afterwards speaking about how hard he works in training and he had nothing but good things to say about him. When you see experienced players making those comments it makes you think this guy is someone with a great future.
This is a massive, massive match for both teams and particularly for Galway. If Galway lose on Sunday, it raises questions about whether the players have faith in the manager and whether they are good enough
Jamesie O'Connor
Dublin vs Galway
This is a massive, massive match for both teams and particularly for Galway. If Galway lose on Sunday, it raises questions about whether the players have faith in the manager and whether they are good enough. It would put another dent in their confidence after an uninspiring league campaign.
On the other hand, if Galway win they would have Laois or Offaly in the semi-final and so would be likely to play in a Leinster final. Cyril Donnellan is now back and he was fantastic for them in 2012. He has had two seasons wrecked by injury but he is going well now.
Galway are a team that on their day can beat anybody. They took Kilkenny to a replay last year and were nine points up against Tipperary until they fell asunder in the second half but they still went toe to toe with the two best teams in the country.
But nobody will fear a Galway team in the qualifiers if they lose to Dublin and are low on morale with county questioning whether Anthony Cunningham is the right manager for the team.
From a Dublin perspective, the league had some great positives but also some negatives.
They started off with two great wins against Tipperary and Kilkenny. Against Clare, they were a in a real match-winning position with a man up and six points playing with the wind in the second half but Dublin ended up losing the game.
They then a good win against Limerick in the quarter-finals but again squandered a match-winning position against Cork when the game was effectively theirs for the taking. When the heat came on and the questions were asked, they couldn’t close it out.
I think those losses may have chipped away at Dublin’s confidence. So while there were a lot of positives, this is a team that has shown a brittleness that leaves questions that they are going to have to answer at the weekend.
